Going forward into the coming year, the most pressing safety concern for US travelers is geopolitical issues, which are becoming more fraught by the day, according to Global Guardian’s 2026 Risk Report.
“Simply put, geopolitics and geoeconomics are going to wildly affect travel patterns moving forward – and that’s a new phenomenon,” said Dale Buckner, CEO of Global Guardian, a global security and medical services provider.
Because of ever-growing geopolitical concerns, Global Guardian, which identifies country-specific safety ratings, began measuring political stability as a tourism risk in 2022.
In the last three years alone, “there have been more geopolitical and geoeconomic changes in the world than there were in the last 30 years,” Buckner said. “In the past, you didn’t really think about travel from a geopolitical or geoeconomic lens.”
It should come as no surprise that one issue – the Trump government’s tariffs – is exacerbating geopolitical concerns.
Buckner cited India as a case in point. “India was a Western-friendly, American-leaning ally,” he said, which is subject to a 50% increase on all goods from the country.
India is now pivoting toward China and Russia, “creating political instability by aligning with the two countries,” Buckner said, citing a recent meeting with the country’s prime minister, Droupadi Murmu, Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin and China’s president Xi Jinping.
“When you think about a tourist traveling to India, which in the past has been a relatively safe environment,” anti-Western sentiment may begin to set in, resulting in risks for travelers, Buckner said.
And, with Russia’s war with Ukraine now well into its third year, “we’re seeing Russia threatening NATO countries in Eastern Europe,” he said, which could affect the risk profile of such bordering countries as Estonia, Romania and Finland.
Geopolitical issues, Buckner noted, are a relatively new issue when it comes to safety concerns, Buckner said.
It’s a new factor that people are not used to thinking about,” he added. “The simple fact is the world is changing.”
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